The group OK Go performed at the opening of my university’s academic year back in late August and the lead singer said that they had just returned from Japan. It looks like they spent some time while there creating the video to accompany the release of their new single I won’t let you down. The group has developed a reputation for creating highly choreographed complex videos that are done in a single take and the new one follows that pattern, with a lot of people engaged in high-precision maneuvers on nifty little motorized unicycles that I had not seen before, though they seem like they are way cooler than the Segway.
What I was curious about was how they did the single tracking shot that started from indoors, went to high above and looking directly down, went down to ground level again, and ended up going high again, especially the last bit when it goes high into the sky and above the clouds.
The precision and overall slickness of the video is pretty impressive. The catch is that I got so absorbed with the visuals that I had no recollection of the song until I had seen it several times.
Update: Here’s more on the video and the unicycles which are called the UNI-CUB and is made by Honda.
It looks they probably used something like this: http://www.draganfly.com/uav-helicopter/draganflyer-x6a/
hackworth,
Yes, that looks like it would fit the bill. Thanks!
On Adam Savage’s podcast there’s an interview with Eric Cheng, a cameraman who flies drones -- about flying a quadcopter over an active volcano. I was nerd-squeeing the whole time.
http://www.tested.com/science/earth/465868-adventuring-eric-cheng-10142014/
There’s also some amazing quadcopter footage of flying through the middle of a fireworks display while everything is blowing up all around.
Marcus,
Those are impressive videos.
The TV show Stargate SG-1 did something similar with a cameraman using a Steadicam and walking onto/off of a crane platform. But this goes much higher, so it must be a drone. I am amazed at how steady the camera is, though.
BTW, nobody mentioned this, I may be just stating what is already obvious to everybody, but they used an undercranked camera to speed up the action and synced their mouths to a slowed down soundtrack. That is why they move so quickly before the clapper frame.
Also, there must have been some sort of computer control of the umbrellas at the end. My guess is that each person had a beeper controlled by a master computer, and they would know to open their umbrella whenever they heard the beep.
moarscienceplz,
You’re right about the speeding up. You can also see it when the dancers move.
I think you’re right. At first I thought the bit at the end must be post production, no way they could coordinate that many dancers but then I thought if each had an ear bud a computer could count down ‘three two one…’
You can see the quad’s shadow at 0:58.
Er, well I suppose it’s actually an octocopter, not a quad.
Hah! Found it. http://instagram.com/p/sY1QFWiSqg/
That’s a DJI S1000: http://www.dji.com/product/spreading-wings-s1000
Honda has a ways to go to catch up with the motorized unicycles in Heinlein’s The Roads Must Roll (an otherwise horrible sf story), but that’s a damn good start!